Rune of Immortality

When Jacob finally stirred from sleep, it was to a familiar sight, the ceiling above him bearing the Skydrid family crest, its intricate patterns carved into the wood like the memory of home etched into his mind. The golden vines, the polished marble inlays, the precise symmetry of the moulding, this was his room, unmistakably so. But that familiarity brought no comfort. He blinked a few times, groggy, then tried to sit up.

The moment he put pressure on his right hand, pain surged like a bolt of lightning up his arm. He gasped, then let out an involuntary scream as he fell back onto the bed, cradling his wrist against his chest.

"Jacob! You're awake!"

Arthur's voice rang out, a mix of relief and concern as he hurried to Jacob's bedside. He knelt beside him, eyes wide, though the joy in them dimmed when he saw Jacob gripping his hand in agony.

Jacob's face was pale, not just from the pain, but from the sudden rush of memories that came crashing down on him like a tidal wave, Castor's twisted expression, Samuel's calm cruelty, the burning pressure in his chest just before he lost consciousness. His breathing grew shallow as the weight of it all settled over him.

"I… I attacked someone from the royal family," Jacob murmured, his voice barely audible. "That's… that's treason. Punishable by—"

"Death, yeah," Arthur interrupted, voice tight. " Castor was apparently under the influence of a spell. There was… supposedly a duel between him and Samuel. That's what they're going with." He paused, then tilted his head. "Nothing happened to Samuel, of course. But seriously, how in the world did you manage to break your wrist?"

Arthur's tone was light, but Jacob didn't respond to the question. He was piecing it together, slowly, painfully. Samuel had hidden the truth. That much was clear. The story about a duel, how could anyone believe that a royal sparring match took place in the middle of a library?

And more importantly, Samuel had attacked him, and now everyone was pretending otherwise.

Arthur straightened up with a sudden grin. "Oh, right! The prince's birthday banquet is tomorrow. Apparently, he'll be fully recovered by then or at least that's what the palace said. You've been out cold for two and a half days. Belemir ordered you a suit while you were asleep."

Jacob blinked again, this time from the surprise. Two and a half days. He hadn't even realized it had been that long. What kind of spell could affect not just him, but Castor too, and keep him unconscious for that long?

He pushed the thoughts aside and rose from the bed, this time careful not to use his injured hand. Step by slow step, he moved toward his desk and picked up the book waiting there, the one Lazarus had written. Its cover was worn, its pages dense with notation and theory, but to Jacob, it was priceless. He remembered the man's final request clearly: to learn a rune before the banquet ended.

Arthur followed him, glancing at the open book with a faint smile. "You know," he said, resting his arm casually on the back of Jacob's chair, "I learned a rune yesterday."

Jacob didn't even look up. Of course Arthur had. With a Grade 1 aspect, learning a basic rune wasn't particularly challenging. His talent ensured a natural affinity with magic. Had Jacob not stubbornly clung to the idea of saving himself for a true rune, he would have learned a few basic ones by now too.

But now that time was running out, he had to be realistic. A simple rune would have to do.

Before diving into the book, though, a question tugged at his thoughts. Jacob turned to Arthur. "What did the king talk to you about?" he asked, voice quiet but firm.

Arthur's expression shifted instantly. The brightness drained from his face. He sat down beside the desk, folding his hands in his lap. "They didn't want to forgive me. Or my siblings," he said, each word heavy. "I could see it in the king's eyes, pure hatred. I thought… I thought they'd execute me. But then Lord Jeremiah appeared. Said he'd take responsibility for me. So instead of death, they marked me with a binding rune."

Jacob's eyes narrowed slightly, though he gave a slow nod. It was expected. No way the king would just let Arthur go free, not after everything his family had done. A binding rune made sense. Likely something that forbade betrayal of the crown, or association with certain groups like Whisper. Jacob didn't even need to hear the conditions to know.

Arthur's eyes dropped to the floor. "It feels like I'm on a leash," he muttered.

Jacob understood. Deeply. He didn't say anything, just placed a hand gently on Arthur's shoulder before returning to the book.

The text was filled with runes, hundreds of them, scattered across the pages with diagrams, annotations, and comparative breakdowns. Jacob knew exactly which one he needed to learn. The Flame Rune, basic, efficient, and versatile. It would allow him to convert his mana into fire. A modest trick, but one that would prove useful, especially at night. No more candles.

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Though it was simple, the process still took time. Jacob cross-referenced versions of the rune from three different books, studying every curve, every proportional requirement, every minute variation. Runes weren't static. They changed subtly depending on the caster's intent, their elemental affinity, or even the speed with which they were drawn. The one he chose was fast to draw and emitted a brilliant light. He wouldn't be fighting with it, he just needed to know it.

It took him another two hours of silent study before he was confident he had committed the rune to memory.

Now came the hard part.

Without wasting any more time, Jacob settled onto the floor, legs crossed, spine straight, and eyes fixed on a spot just ahead of him, though his focus was already turning inward. This was the part every mage struggled with, the first and often most frustrating step of rune casting was not drawing the shape or recalling the sequence, but simply getting the mana to move.

Mana wasn't stored in the fingers or the mind or the air around him. It was drawn in from the environment and naturally settled deep inside the heart, where it lingered like a sleeping current, still and sluggish. To access it, Jacob had to concentrate, truly concentrate, not just with his eyes closed, but with his entire awareness trained on his chest, blocking out everything else.

He slowed his breathing. Inhaled. Exhaled. He let the tension bleed out from his shoulders and neck, and focused on the rhythmic thump of his heartbeat, the steady, anchoring sound of blood pulsing through his body, grounding him. After a while, when that was all he could hear, he went deeper, concentrating on the heart itself. And then, barely audible beneath the rush of his pulse, he heard it, the soft, swaying, almost liquid motion of mana, sloshing faintly within his chest like water resting in a cup.

He reached for it.

At first, it resisted. Mana, by nature, didn't like to be disturbed. It wanted to settle, to sleep. But Jacob pulled harder, gritting his teeth. The mana remained still, inert, unmoved by his intent. He furrowed his brow, clenched his jaw, and pulled harder, not physically, but mentally, with a strain that felt like trying to lift something far too heavy with hands that weren't quite his own. Sweat began to form along his hairline and roll down the side of his face, and his muscles tensed from the sheer focus it demanded.

His fingers curled inward, and he grit his teeth until his jaw ached, channelling every ounce of willpower into the effort of guiding that invisible stream of mana out from his heart and into his hand.

Then, after what felt like an eternity, a few agonizing minutes of silent struggle the faintest shimmer began to form on his palm.

It was small, almost negligible at first. A single thread of pure white energy, glowing with a delicate inner light, barely visible in the dim room. But it was there, real and warm and alive, sparkling ever so slightly like frost kissed by morning sun.

Jacob stared at it with a mixture of wonder and relief. That was his mana. He had controlled it. He had made it move.

He didn't pause to celebrate.

Keeping his breathing steady, he closed his eyes once more and brought to mind the shape of the Flame Rune. He had studied it for hours, each stroke, each angle, each curve memorized with precision. He saw it clearly now, floating behind his eyelids like a glowing diagram, and slowly began to guide the mana across his palm, shaping it stroke by stroke into the rune's familiar structure.

The process was slow. Agonizingly so. Every movement had to be exact. The rune's symmetry, its line thickness, its intersections, if even one part was off, it wouldn't activate. But Jacob took his time. He didn't rush. He placed every line with care, and when he finally looked down again, the rune was complete, elegant, precise, and pulsing gently with the mana he had used to form it.

Now came the final step.

Right now, the mana he'd drawn out was dormant, just raw energy, arranged in a shape but doing nothing. But all it took to activate a rune was a single, deliberate thought. The mana would respond to the pattern it had been forced into and react accordingly. In this case, it would generate heat, then fire, and a small flame would appear just above his hand.

Jacob inhaled deeply, held the breath for a moment, then exhaled as he pushed the thought into his mind, ignite.

He waited.

Nothing happened.

He frowned slightly, then tried again, this time more forcefully. Ignite. The mana responded, it moved, pulsed but the rune didn't react. There was no spark, no warmth, no flame.

Confused, Jacob repeated the process again. And again. Each time, he could feel the mana activate, it was clearly no longer dormant but the rune didn't trigger. It was like the mana didn't recognize the pattern it was sitting in. Like it was completely ignoring the structure he'd so carefully drawn.

Then, as frustration began to seep into the corners of his mind, a thought crept up from the depths of memory, uninvited, cold, and unwelcome.

Scholar of True Runes.

His aspect. At the time, Jacob had just thought it would let him draw true runes, but what if it also stopped him from using normal ones. Now, with this rune failing to activate, and his mana refusing to obey the pattern, a terrible possibility began to take shape in the back of his mind.

"No," he whispered under his breath, shaking his head. "No, that's not it."

He refused to believe it.

Throwing himself back into the work, he reached for another book, flipped to a different rune, a simpler one and began the process again. He shaped the mana, activated it. Nothing. He grabbed another rune, then another, switching to basic utility runes, even those used by children in magical schools. None of them worked.

He kept going for hours, pushing through exhaustion, eyes dry and bloodshot from the effort, body aching from the strain. But every time, it was the same result. His mana would form the rune perfectly, activate cleanly, and then… do nothing.

Eventually, the denial gave way to something quieter, heavier, and more final. It was no longer about the runes it was about the truth behind them.

His mana wasn't reacting to patterns.

It didn't matter how simple or well-formed the rune was. It wasn't about execution. It wasn't about effort. It was that his mana, by its very nature, simply didn't respond to conventional runes at all.

Jacob felt his chest tighten, his hands trembling slightly as he sat back, the last fading threads of hope slipping through his fingers like ash. His thoughts spiralled, doubt, panic, fear all crashing in at once. But beneath the storm of emotion, one truth rang louder than all the others.

Unless he could learn a true rune, one of the ancient, forgotten symbols that even most master mages had never seen he would never be able to use magic. Not real magic. Not even a spark.

And that meant, as far as the world was concerned, Jacob wasn't a mage at all.

He was useless.